The Federal  Government will seek a lasting peace settlement with militants in the oil-producing southern Niger Delta region in 2017, President Muhammadu Buhari said in a New Year’s message on Saturday.

Attacks on oil facilities in Nigeria’s energy hub, coupled with low oil prices, helped push Africa’s biggest economy into recession – the first in 25 years – in the second quarter. Crude oil sales account for two-thirds of government revenue in the OPEC-member country.

Attacks by militants, who want a greater share of the country’s energy wealth to go to the impoverished oil-producing swampland, have been less frequent since November when Buhari held talks with community leaders from the region.

“We will continue to pursue peace initiatives in the Niger Delta as I, again, call on our brothers in that region who have taken to violent disruptions of economic infrastructure to come to the negotiating table,” Buhari said in an emailed statement.

The attacks cut Nigeria’s oil production, which stood at 2.1 million barrels per day (bpd) at the start of 2016, by more than a third in the summer.

Repairs to oil facilities have since lifted production, which reached nearly 1.8 million bpd in December, according to oil minister Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu.

But sporadic attacks, most recently in late November, have been carried out by groups that are not taking part in peace talks.

“In this new year, I want to reassure all Nigerians that our defense and security forces are more than ever before ready to perform their constitutional role of protecting lives and property,” Buhari said.

He listed other security concerns, including the threat posed by Islamist militant group Boko Haram which the president said last week had been pushed out of its stronghold in the remote northeastern Sambisa forest.

President Buhari also said that his administration’s determination to wrestle corruption to the ground remains unshaken.

And to underscore that he is unrelenting in waging the war, President Buhari announced that his government would probe the shenanigans reported in connection with IDP funds and punish culprits.

The President, who gave the assurance in his New Year message to Nigerians, however, said that the fight against corruption would be guided by respect for the rule of law and due process.

He vowed that his administration would not spare anybody or organ of government in the ongoing crusade against corrupt practices.

“It is a collective undertaking and resolve that must be seen to its logical conclusion in spite of certain distractions.

”The fate of our country lies partly in the success of this campaign. It will be unthinkable on my part to allow the boat of this crucial campaign promise capsize mid-stream,’’ he added.

On the economy, President Buhari said his administration had focused its energies to turn around the economy, create jobs, fight corruption, and transform agriculture to replace oil and gas as a major revenue earner for the nation.

“I am encouraged that we are getting things right.’’

According to him, agricultural revolution has begun and farmers in different parts of the country are experiencing bumper harvests while states are getting into strategic partnership towards attaining self-sufficiency in rice.

He said that “the era of over-dependence on oil for foreign exchange revenues was  gradually waning.

“I am optimistic that the CHANGE we all yearned for in voting this administration to power in 2015 will manifest more and be sustained in different sectors, particularly agriculture, in 2017.’’

He noted that the nation’s economic recovery and growth plan in 2017 was anchored on optimizing the use of local content and empowering local businesses.

”In pursuit of this administration’s philosophy, we will continue to appeal that we buy “Made In Nigeria” goods.

“Like I said during the 2017 Budget presentation to the National Assembly, farmers, small and medium-sized manufacturers, agro-allied businesses, dressmakers, entertainers and technology start-ups, will remain the true drivers of our economic future.

”They are the engine of our economic recovery and their needs underpin our Economic Recovery and Growth Plan,’’ he further maintained.

On job creation, the President stated that his administration would sustain existing programmes aimed at lifting a vast number of the youth out of poverty, while at the same time creating the opportunities for people to fend for themselves.

President Buhari thanked Nigerians for their support to his administration’s efforts to transform Nigeria.

“I assure you again that the current pains are temporary and will ease when the economic seeds in gestation begin to bloom to fruition” he said.